LUND UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES

Oskyldigt dömda - mardröm eller verklighet?

No one wants to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. No one wants to be accused of having committed a crime one hasn't committed. No one wants to be innocently convicted. According to the presumption of innocence (article 6.2. in ECHR) everyone who has been charged with a criminal offence shall be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law. It is important that the judge remembers to apply the presumption of innocence, but it is usually difficult to determine if the suspect really is guilty or innocent. Therefore the judge can easily make a mistake and convict an innocent man. The purpose of my graduate theses was to investigate if the presumption of innocence in theory corresponds to the presumption of innocence in... (More)

No one wants to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. No one wants to be accused of having committed a crime one hasn't committed. No one wants to be innocently convicted. According to the presumption of innocence (article 6.2. in ECHR) everyone who has been charged with a criminal offence shall be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law. It is important that the judge remembers to apply the presumption of innocence, but it is usually difficult to determine if the suspect really is guilty or innocent. Therefore the judge can easily make a mistake and convict an innocent man. The purpose of my graduate theses was to investigate if the presumption of innocence in theory corresponds to the presumption of innocence in practice. My purpose was principally to investigate, analyze and answer the following questions. What is the meaning of the conception innocently convicted? How frequently are people being innocently convicted? Why are people being innocently convicted? Should something in the law in force be altered? (How can you prevent people from being innocently convicted in the future?) The questions were answered by a comparative legal dogmatic method and I compared Sweden to USA. An inquiry was carried out to investigate and analyze how advocates, judges and prosecutors define the conception innocently convicted, why they think people are being innocently convicted, how frequently people are being innocently convicted and how they think that you can prevent people from being innocently convicted in the future. While I wrote my graduate theses, I was working as a trainee at a law firm in Malmö. Therefore I investigated and analyzed not only laws, preparatory work, practice, doctrine and material from the Internet, but also an authentic case from the law firm in Malmö in which the suspect claimed he was innocently convicted. The conception innocently convicted has different meanings depending on which definition of innocently convicted you use. Moreover, you can talk about people that are being wrongly convicted, really innocent, formally innocent or you can talk about errors of justice. My conclusion is that the best conception to use is innocently convicted and that the best definition of the innocently convicted is completely innocent people that have been convicted although they haven't committed any crimes at all. That definition should be used in Sweden and in USA. People are not being innocently convicted very often according to the result of the inquiry since 61% of the lawyers thought that people are seldom being innocently convicted. The fact that lawyers are a part of a judicial system that doesn't work (since people are being innocently convicted) is not really something to brag about, which is why many lawyers said that people are seldom being innocently convicted. It is however difficult to say how frequently people are being innocently convicted since you can't be sure if the suspect is guilty or innocent. Because of this it is difficult to say if the suspect in the authentic case from the law firm in Malmö was being innocently convicted or not. My conclusion is that people are being innocently convicted sometimes. That is why the presumption of innocence in theory doesn't always correspond to the presumption of innocence in practice. That is also why the problem with innocently convicted is a reality, not a nightmare. Another conclusion is that people are being innocently convicted more often in USA than in Sweden and the reason for that is, among other things, that USA has a jury system. This is frightening since some of the states in USA still use the death penalty. There are many reasons for why people are innocently convicted. Sometimes it has to do with bad evidence or (deliberate or indeliberate) mistakes made by people working in the judicial system. A man can be innocently convicted if he confesses to a crime he didn't commit. My conclusion is that this usually doesn't happen in Sweden, but that it can happen in USA since a confession in USA can give the suspect a good plea bargain. If the suspect has a bad advocate, he can be convicted even though he is completely innocent. My conclusion is that it is true since advocates seem to work more carefully when they work with business law than when they work with criminal law and procedure. People can also be innocently convicted if there is a community pressure for convictions. My conclusion is that there is a community pressure for convictions since people often look at crimes from the victim's perspective just like the media does. The media doesn't emphasize the fact that there is a presumption of innocence and the one who becomes convicted by the media gets a mark that can affect him for the rest of his life (for instance when he is looking for a job). Judges are influenced by the media since they are humans, not robots. My conclusion is that there is a community pressure for convictions and that the judges (deliberately or indeliberately) are influenced by this pressure. There are many different ways in which you can prevent people from being innocently convicted in the future. My conclusion is that you can prevent people from being innocently convicted by increasing the financial recourses for the crime scene investigation so that the evidence becomes as good as possible. Another conclusion is that people who are working in the judicial system should try to do a better job since it would reduce the risk of becoming innocently convicted. When it comes to altering the law in force, my conclusion is that the law in force is good. It is not suitable to dismiss people (who are working in the judicial system) who have made mistakes so that other people have been innocently convicted since it is difficult to determine why someone has been innocently convicted. Instead it is suitable to educate the people who are working in the judicial system about the problem with innocently convicted so that they become more aware of this serious problem. As we know, no one wants to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. No one wants to be accused of having committed a crime one hasn't committed. No one wants to be innocently convicted. (Less)

@misc{1561917,
abstract = {No one wants to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. No one wants to be accused of having committed a crime one hasn't committed. No one wants to be innocently convicted. According to the presumption of innocence (article 6.2. in ECHR) everyone who has been charged with a criminal offence shall be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law. It is important that the judge remembers to apply the presumption of innocence, but it is usually difficult to determine if the suspect really is guilty or innocent. Therefore the judge can easily make a mistake and convict an innocent man. The purpose of my graduate theses was to investigate if the presumption of innocence in theory corresponds to the presumption of innocence in practice. My purpose was principally to investigate, analyze and answer the following questions. What is the meaning of the conception innocently convicted? How frequently are people being innocently convicted? Why are people being innocently convicted? Should something in the law in force be altered? (How can you prevent people from being innocently convicted in the future?) The questions were answered by a comparative legal dogmatic method and I compared Sweden to USA. An inquiry was carried out to investigate and analyze how advocates, judges and prosecutors define the conception innocently convicted, why they think people are being innocently convicted, how frequently people are being innocently convicted and how they think that you can prevent people from being innocently convicted in the future. While I wrote my graduate theses, I was working as a trainee at a law firm in Malmö. Therefore I investigated and analyzed not only laws, preparatory work, practice, doctrine and material from the Internet, but also an authentic case from the law firm in Malmö in which the suspect claimed he was innocently convicted. The conception innocently convicted has different meanings depending on which definition of innocently convicted you use. Moreover, you can talk about people that are being wrongly convicted, really innocent, formally innocent or you can talk about errors of justice. My conclusion is that the best conception to use is innocently convicted and that the best definition of the innocently convicted is completely innocent people that have been convicted although they haven't committed any crimes at all. That definition should be used in Sweden and in USA. People are not being innocently convicted very often according to the result of the inquiry since 61% of the lawyers thought that people are seldom being innocently convicted. The fact that lawyers are a part of a judicial system that doesn't work (since people are being innocently convicted) is not really something to brag about, which is why many lawyers said that people are seldom being innocently convicted. It is however difficult to say how frequently people are being innocently convicted since you can't be sure if the suspect is guilty or innocent. Because of this it is difficult to say if the suspect in the authentic case from the law firm in Malmö was being innocently convicted or not. My conclusion is that people are being innocently convicted sometimes. That is why the presumption of innocence in theory doesn't always correspond to the presumption of innocence in practice. That is also why the problem with innocently convicted is a reality, not a nightmare. Another conclusion is that people are being innocently convicted more often in USA than in Sweden and the reason for that is, among other things, that USA has a jury system. This is frightening since some of the states in USA still use the death penalty. There are many reasons for why people are innocently convicted. Sometimes it has to do with bad evidence or (deliberate or indeliberate) mistakes made by people working in the judicial system. A man can be innocently convicted if he confesses to a crime he didn't commit. My conclusion is that this usually doesn't happen in Sweden, but that it can happen in USA since a confession in USA can give the suspect a good plea bargain. If the suspect has a bad advocate, he can be convicted even though he is completely innocent. My conclusion is that it is true since advocates seem to work more carefully when they work with business law than when they work with criminal law and procedure. People can also be innocently convicted if there is a community pressure for convictions. My conclusion is that there is a community pressure for convictions since people often look at crimes from the victim's perspective just like the media does. The media doesn't emphasize the fact that there is a presumption of innocence and the one who becomes convicted by the media gets a mark that can affect him for the rest of his life (for instance when he is looking for a job). Judges are influenced by the media since they are humans, not robots. My conclusion is that there is a community pressure for convictions and that the judges (deliberately or indeliberately) are influenced by this pressure. There are many different ways in which you can prevent people from being innocently convicted in the future. My conclusion is that you can prevent people from being innocently convicted by increasing the financial recourses for the crime scene investigation so that the evidence becomes as good as possible. Another conclusion is that people who are working in the judicial system should try to do a better job since it would reduce the risk of becoming innocently convicted. When it comes to altering the law in force, my conclusion is that the law in force is good. It is not suitable to dismiss people (who are working in the judicial system) who have made mistakes so that other people have been innocently convicted since it is difficult to determine why someone has been innocently convicted. Instead it is suitable to educate the people who are working in the judicial system about the problem with innocently convicted so that they become more aware of this serious problem. As we know, no one wants to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. No one wants to be accused of having committed a crime one hasn't committed. No one wants to be innocently convicted.},
author = {Singh, Doris},
keyword = {Processrätt,Straffrätt},
language = {swe},
note = {Student Paper},
title = {Oskyldigt dömda - mardröm eller verklighet?},
year = {2008},
}